Treatment of multiple adjacent RT 1 gingival recessions with the modified coronally advanced tunnel (MCAT) technique and a collagen matrix or palatal connective tissue graft: 9-year results of a split-mouth randomized clinical trial

Clinical Oral Investigations - To evaluate t he long-term outcomes following treatment of RT 1 multiple adjacent gingival recessions (MAGR) using the modified coronally advanced tunnel (MCAT) with...     

Opposing patterns in self-reported and measured physical activity levels in middle-aged adults

Physical activity brings significant health benefits to middle-aged adults, although the research to date has been focused on late adulthood. This study aims to examine how ageing affects the self-reported and accelerometer-derived measures of physical activity levels in middle-aged adults. We employed the data recorded in the UK Biobank and analysed the physical activity levels of 2,998 participants (1381 men and 1617 women), based on self-completion questionnaire and accelerometry measurement of physical activity. We also assessed the musculoskeletal health of the participants using the dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) measurements provided by the UK Biobank. Participants were categorised into three groups according to their age: group I younger middle-aged (40 to 49 years), group II older middle-aged (50 to 59 years), and group III oldest middle-aged (60 to 69 years). Self-reported physical activity level increased with age and was the highest in group III, followed by group II and I (P?<?0.05). On the contrary, physical activity measured by accelerometry decreased significantly with age from group I to III (P?<?0.05), and the same pertained to the measurements of musculoskeletal health (P?<?0.05). It was also shown that middle-aged adults mostly engaged in low and moderate intensity activities. The opposing trends of the self-reported and measured physical activity levels may suggest that middle-aged adults over-report their activity level as they age. They should be aware of the difference between their perceived and actual physical activity levels, and objective measures would be useful to prevent the decline in musculoskeletal health.

     

Correction: Thrombotic and bleeding events,mortality, and anticoagulant use among 546,656 hospitalized patients with COVID‑19 in the United States: a retrospective cohort study

Journal of Thrombosis and Thrombolysis -     

Effect of iron deficiency without anaemia on days alive and out of hospital in patients undergoing valvular heart surgery

Comprehensive evidence regarding the treatment of non-anaemic iron deficiency in patients undergoing valvular heart surgery is lacking. This study aimed to investigate the association between non-anaemic iron deficiency and postoperative outcomes in these patients. We retrospectively analysed 321 patients of which 180 (56%) had iron deficiency (defined as serum ferritin < 100 ng.ml^-1 or < 300 ng.ml^-1 with transferrin saturation < 20%). While the iron-deficient group had lower pre-operative haemoglobin levels than the non-iron deficient group (median (IQR [range]) 134 (127–141 [120–172]) g.l^-1, 143 (133–150 [120–179]) g.l^-1, p = 0.001), there was no between-group difference in allogeneic red blood cell transfusion. Median (IQR [range]) days alive and out of hospital at postoperative day 90 was 1 day shorter in the iron-deficient group (80 (77–82 [9–85]) days vs. 81 (79–83 [0–85]) days, p = 0.026). In multivariable analysis, only cardiopulmonary bypass duration (p = 0.032) and intra-operative allogeneic red blood cell transfusion (p = 0.011) were significantly associated with reduced days alive and out of hospital at postoperative day 90. Iron deficiency did not exert any adverse influence on secondary outcomes except length of hospital stay. Our findings indicate that non-anaemic iron deficiency alone is not associated with adverse effects in patients undergoing valvular heart surgery when it does not translate into an increased risk of allogeneic transfusion.     

A Coupled FEM-BEM Approach for the Solution of the Free-Boundary Axi-Symmetric Plasma Equilibrium Problem

In this paper we present a coupled Finite Element Method – Boundary Element Method (FEM-BEM) approach for the solution of the free-boundary axi-symmetric plasma equilibrium problem. The proposed method, obtained from an improvement of the Hagenow-Lackner coupling method, allows to efficiently model the equilibrium problem in unbounded domains by discretizing only the plasma region; the external conductors can be modelled either as 2D or 3D models, according to the problem of interest. The paper explores different iterative methods for the solution of the nonlinear Grad-Shafranov equation, such as Picard, Newton-Raphson and Newton-Krylov, in order to provide a robust and reliable tool, able to handle large-scale problems (e.g. high resolution equilibria). This method has been implemented in the FRIDA code (FRee-boundary Integro-Differential Axisimmetric – https://github. om/matteobonotto/ FRIDA), together with a suitable Adaptive Integration Technique (AIT) for the computation of the source term. FRIDA has been successfully tested and validated against experimental data from RFX-mod device, and numerical equilibria of an ITER-like device.